Manali, a high altitude hill station in Himalayas is where this story begins. Themed cafes serving piping hot and fresh food with the best hashish in the world this unique place is perfect for the laid back attitude in me. I have come here several times and I usually stay in a homestay called upcountry lodge. Uncle, aunty and little adorable Mishty a mountain girl who bumps into everything and loves to fall down live here, I prefer staying here because I am very attached to this family. It feels like a home away from home experience when I'm here. This time I decided I'm not going to loiter around cafes meeting random travellers, well it is a learning experience to do so but now I'm in a different mood, Im craving adventure, I need to explore on wheels and I have this sudden urge to go where? Thats right Leh, Khardungla (The highest motor-able road in the world) and Pangong lake I want to see it all, and I want to see it on a royal enfield 350cc. Back home I ride a 500cc renting out a 350 works out cheaper and makes the difficulty higher which I enjoy. I have a local friend in Manali who never says no, not just to me but to any traveller who needs anything in his home town he is someone who will help anybody he can. This great guy Arun Thakur happens to be my good friend who I met in a basic mountaineering course, he was also the best cadet of the course, my friend offered me his 350cc and I asked him if he can come along show me the route and be my guide. Of course he said with a friendly gesture. The next thing we find ourselves doing Is buying jerry cans, ropes, rain sheets and a rented carrier for the rejuvenating journey to Leh. The target right now is to cross Rohtang pass before it gets dark. there is no road until you cross Rohtang. literally no road.
Thats me speechless.
Meet little mishty at upcountry.
Take a look at our map, source - https://www.stikage.com/map_jeepleh.htm
Arun & me ready to roll!
Here we are trying to get out of Rohtang while its already dark and the temperatures are constantly dropping and its raining heavily. The ride had not begun as per our plans it never does in my experience. we were stuck inside the mud since there is no road, so one of us had to get down to get out of the mud, there were times because of the heavy load that we carried the bike had to be pushed out from the behind. At times it needed more than one person to get out of the rut. lorry drivers and military helped us along the way.
Heres me trying to cross the river without keeping my foot down.
some how the same night with some pleasurable pain we got to keylong because from keylong onwands we didn't want to be night riding since day's got the view. In keylong we found a cafe with beds, hot food and a fireplace didn't have to pitch a tent right now, I had a bed and it costed less than 4 dollars!
so we woke up here with a mission to cross the baralacha pass before the night and stay at pang camp. The morning was beautiful but our asses were broken on the bike and healthy sheeps were crossing our way. There was pain but the message of pain never reached the brain while the focus was diverted to see the beauty of mother nature. This was a very valuable message I learned. Diversion of pain & to what extent the human body can be pushed.
check out the video of the sheeps, sounds of moving them was a very spiritual experience.
Nature is spiritual for me not religion.
surprisingly from pang onward everything was plain this was excitingly different but we had to stay the night around pang to enjoy the plains ride with the day light. We chose to pitch our tent in a small village called whiskey nalla. The biggest mistake. lowest in oxygen levels and coldest place near pang camp. Being adventurous we tend to make such beautiful mistakes. The night was impossible to sleep because of the low oxygen levels but some how caught up with some sleep and woke up to a lot of people puking their loads out. Maybe thats why they called it whiskey nalla. Here there were 2 French cyclist who were cycling to leh. with their tents and bicycles. Salute you two guys if you read this someday. They were our inspiration that morning. moving on to more plains and Tanglangla I will show you some pictures until tanglangla. I love to pronounce Tanglangla try it out you will enjoy it.
So its like this you leave a mark with a few stones in memory of being in this heaven.
Here we are at baralachu pass now
Its our third day & right now I am fantasising about having momos and Maggi soup in leh. Aimed to be there for lunch and we did it!
Thats leh city you see down there.
The feeling of accomplishment
Heres a short video Enroute to leh
Here we are in leh having our lunch around mid day after which we need to look for a homestay that wasn't very difficult since I was used to spotting them & I wasn't on foot we had a bike. cruising around leh spotted a few homestays and I chose one of them. met a peaceful family living here with 2 sons and a daughter in their middle age. It is just unbelievable how selflessly this family could do for someone visiting them for a couple of nights to stay. quickly we became family altogether. they asked us what we would like to eat, my regular answer is what ever you make for yourself. I like to try what the locals of those places are eating. so everything was good we took the days off. drank some local booze, its pure white and made from starch at home no head aches in the morning and the body pain was vanished like magic. khardungla was jus 40kms from leh, its known to be the highest motorable road in the world. With all our backpacks and other things left in the homestay the bike felt as though I could lift it with one hand, it was a pleasurable ride to khardungla. everyone was clicking pictures in turns at the border road organisation bord that mentions where we are right now. Behind khardungla there is a very peaceful Buddhist shrine known as stupa.
There is no other place I want to be right now.
let me tell you what I was feeling there, i was having mixed feelings of peace, tranquility, in harmony with nature, a self-esteem boost & a high sense of achievement. This connection with nature, changed my life. When I went home I was a changed person somethings magically had transformed inside me. The story is not over yet, you are going to pangong lake with me now. We got back from khardungla to our homestay where aunty had prepared dinner for us. We had our dinner and the two sons and uncle invited us for a drink to the terrace, so we went. Drank a little spoke about their culture, religion and way of life before I got too tired and went to sleep. Pangong lake was not too far just about 225 kms or 139 miles away. This was a stretch we planned on completing the same day evening return because we had our stuff here and I had my tickets booked to fly back home in 3 days. never did I know that the spokes of the tyres would break and in the entire of leh city there was just one guy who knew how to fix those spokes and unfortunately he had gone home to visit his family about 500kms away. I need to learn how to fix spokes.
Here we are at Pangong lake wondering how to get back to leh with those broken spokes, the breathtaking view and a dip inside was relaxing.
After a bit of searching we found a truck that would transport us with our bike back to leh.
Thats the two of us in a truck with our bike tied up. Nothing to feel sad about it was a learning experience to carry your own pump and tuble always. If we had our pump and tube nothing could have broken those spokes. We got to leh, leh had a royal enfield showroom for our relief. The problem here was the only guy who could fix the spokes had gone back home for his holidays. We searched the whole city down for a guy to get these spokes fixed. royal enfield in leh only sold us the spokes but they wouldn't fix it for us. Their option was to buy new tyres, hell no we weren't buying new tyres they would cost me a fortune. The beautiful humans in the homestay came to our rescue and offered us their tyre in exchange of our tyre with the spoke set. Aunty made us some muchies for the way, chocolates and a bottle of juice I hugged her and left. We were happy glad and satisfied, on our way home!
Thank you for joining me in my journey. Please do up vote, resteem and comment every dollar earned will be used for my next bike Trip to tibet from India this September. Do join me.
Peace & love.
